How far would you expect to pull the shadows up from ?

BADGER.BRAD

BADGER.BRAD

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Hello all,

I fairly rescently brought a Sony A6000 with the intention of using less film but having much more dynamic range than my digital point and shoots. Unfortunately this does not seem to be the case with the camera either blowing the highlights or me not being able to recover the shadows. I was wandering how far you are able to recover the shadows from in general ? I only use basic software ( I don't really like having to use a PC for photography) but wandered if it was my basic software that was letting me down.

Thanks all
 
My experience is very different from yours.
I bought an a6000 a few years ago as a walkabout.
I regularly pull the shadows up by a couple of stops (in Lightroom) - sometimes more.
I've just gone back and revisited a 3 shot HDR bracket, at +-2 stops, and increased the underexposed file by 2 stops in Lightroom to match the "normally" exposed one. Perfectly fine. It might be an old Sony sensor, but the results wrt noise etc are excellent.
 
My camera is awful and fails to do a straight out of camera shot unless it is bright and sunny with low contrast then it can look superb. My software is very basic and as you lift the shadows it gets to a point where it starts to cause problems with the highlights so you either end up with blown high lights or very deep shadows.I am only shooting in .jpeg though.
My old £9 ebay point and shoot quite often does better straight out of camera.
 
By this are you saying I'm always going to struggle to get a straight out of camera image with the Sony ?
 
BADGER.BRAD said:
By this are you saying I'm always going to struggle to get a straight out of camera image with the Sony ?
Click to expand...

No I’m not saying that, the Sony is more than capable, but like any digital camera has limitations when presented with a high dynamic range scene - when that happens you have to choices to make - either use an inbuilt HDR mode, shoot bracketed images and combine in post production or expose not to blow the highlights and drag the shadows up afterwards.

it’s a differeway if working- that’s all
 
BADGER.BRAD said:
By this are you saying I'm always going to struggle to get a straight out of camera image with the Sony ?
Click to expand...

I'm going to disagree with David here - yes, you are almost always going to struggle to get what you want SOOC unless you're going to muck about with filters on the front like we did in the days of film. Your budget compacts work for you because the process the image first for you - I suspect you'd be even happier pictures from a phone camera with all the processing effects turned on that compensate for normal conditions, and with a collection of filters that can be applied to give a bit of drama or pop.

My experience - not everyone feels this way - is that EVERY camera can only produce a photo that's an acceptable place to start work at best. I'm pretty sure the Sony is presenting you with images that have all the potential locked up in them to be better than the best point-and-shoot, but need you to draw it out. You could try better software, although using linux you're limited in choice.
 
What your saying Toni makes total sense, As I am very time limited I am normally doing photography at the same time as doing another activity so in a lot of ways the phone is much more convenient quite often I can take a shot and walk away without having to worry about spending more time sitting in front of a PC later. I also realize that if I had or was prepared to spend time in front of the PC a technically better camera would produce better shots with work. As I have so little time I've never been able to master better software so tend only to do very little post processing on simple to use software.
 
I've selected a photo I have which causes my software problems if I raise the shadows before they are at an acceptable level if I try to expose higher in camera it blows the clouds.

It is a .JPG but I have had to reduce the file size quite a lot to post here.

ggg.JPG
 
BADGER.BRAD said:
I've selected a photo I have which causes my software problems if I raise the shadows before they are at an acceptable level if I try to expose higher in camera it blows the clouds.

It is a .JPG but I have had to reduce the file size quite a lot to post here.

View attachment 283213
Click to expand...

sigh...please go and try a RAW file instead of attempting the impossible, you've had lots of advice both in this thread and the other one, use it (please)
 
Bob asked me to post such a photo as there is a size limit to what can be posted that is the best I can do ? If you had actually bothered to read the above posts you would have realized that one I'm very time limited and two hate spending what free time I have sitting in front of a PC ! I'm struggling to see why your called Mr Perceptive at this point.
 
BADGER.BRAD said:
I've selected a photo I have which causes my software problems if I raise the shadows before they are at an acceptable level if I try to expose higher in camera it blows the clouds.

It is a .JPG but I have had to reduce the file size quite a lot to post here.

View attachment 283213
Click to expand...

In an ideal world shoot and process raw files, there is just more info to work with. If you only can use jpegs for whatever reason then I would say your software is not helping. The image is really small but lifting the shadows seems to work ok in photoshop. Wether you like it or not post processing is something you should invest a bit of time in.shadows.jpg
 
BADGER.BRAD said:
Bob asked me to post such a photo as there is a size limit to what can be posted that is the best I can do ? If you had actually bothered to read the above posts you would have realized that one I'm very time limited and two hate spending what free time I have sitting in front of a PC !
Click to expand...

In that case it might be worth spending some time setting up the camera to produce the kind of jpegs which are to your liking as the default settings clearly don't satisfy you. There has been advice on how that might be achieved in your other thread.
 
BADGER.BRAD said:
I've selected a photo I have which causes my software problems if I raise the shadows before they are at an acceptable level if I try to expose higher in camera it blows the clouds.

It is a .JPG but I have had to reduce the file size quite a lot to post here.

View attachment 283213
Click to expand...

My take on it in PS with 3 steps:-
Levels to adjust the midtones to lift the shadows > USM with Low Contrast Enhancement > Smart Sharpen

gggEDIT.jpg

But as discussed above there is the "I would not have started from here...."....... though as I said this was in PS and took about 1 minute
 
With the amount of dynamic range in that image you'll not get it right in camera.

Neither would you on a film camera (especially transparencies).

Digital needs a computer to make the most of an image mate.

You may not like sitting at a computer but you'll have to to get an acceptable image from your example.

It's just physics.
 
GreenNinja67 said:
With the amount of dynamic range in that image you'll not get it right in camera.

Neither would you on a film camera (especially transparencies).

Digital needs a computer to make the most of an image mate.

You may not like sitting at a computer but you'll have to to get an acceptable image from your example.

It's just physics.
Click to expand...

There is a lot going into camera phones, I can perceive of one with 2 to 3 lenses and separate (?) sensors that will take three identical images but three different exposures and with fairy dust produce an image with expanded DR that does not look like an overcooked HDR !
 
Your efforts are far better than I can achieve with my software even with the larger file, I did send the image to my smartphone and tried editing with the Snapseed editing app which worked far better than the simple editing app I have on my PC but it was a lot of hassle ( I was only viewing on the phone screen) it just a shame it doesn't exist for Linux or something fast and easy to get to grips with. I think I'll stick with the compact or phone or buy more film for now not that there any better but at least I don't feel so frustrated when the results don't turn out so well £9 vs £400 is a big difference.
 
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BADGER.BRAD said:
it just a shame it doesn't exist for Linux
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I don't know which distro you use, but you really should try DigiKam for image processing if you can: easy, powerful, uses KDE dependencies & libraries. IIRC Shotwell was fairly unimpressive when I last looked a few years back.
 
Box Brownie said:
There is a lot going into camera phones, I can perceive of one with 2 to 3 lenses and separate (?) sensors that will take three identical images but three different exposures and with fairy dust produce an image with expanded DR that does not look like an overcooked HDR !
Click to expand...

Yeah but that's not a camera to me Box.
 
GreenNinja67 said:
Yeah but that's not a camera to me Box.
Click to expand...

You and me both............it is a specialised(?) imaging device ;)

What caught my eye was a recent/current advert for a phone but it mentioned nothing in regard to 'phone' and was all about "photography"!
 
Box Brownie said:
You and me both............it is a specialised(?) imaging device ;)

What caught my eye was a recent/current advert for a phone but it mentioned nothing in regard to 'phone' and was all about "photography"!
Click to expand...

The 'phone' side of things was sorted a long time ago - now we have a device that's used for capturing situations and posting them to the world's view.
 
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